Anotherloverholeinyohead said:

I wish Prince would stipulate that no drinks nor drunks are allowed into the aftershow! That is anybody acting crazy(drunk or not) or anybody with a friuty odor on their breath(easy to smell when intoxicated) as the most likely about to act stupid! Just a word to the Wise! I realize a performer has no/little control in a Large Arena-too bad for real fans of an Artist! It can make or break the lesson of Artistery!Come on Mr. Man!

I was sad because I couldn't go to another Prince concert, but after reading this I would have been more sad and disappointed had I gone because if the aggression was this bad, i would have left before the show started because I travel alone

So for those who have been 2 IndigO2....
Can u please tell me what it's like in the upstairs section? I got 2 tix last minute for the 21st of Sept seated upstairs... and I would love 2 know what the view is like etc...
What's the capacity of this joint? The queues have been huuuuuge!!!

Also... If you have tickets... regular non-vip for the venue... is there a seperate queue? or is that seriously long queue for every one i.e those who don't have VIP or aren't press etc....

Thanx
[Edited 8/5/07 17:21pm]

BA BA BA BABY ...U AINT SEEN NUTHIN YET!!!....but remenber if someones gets killed at a show it will not only tarn the image of the fans drinking but prince would be forced to cancel some or all of the remaining shows or aftershows.

I think it is sad that this is happening... No wonder Prince doesn't perform,
or comes out for his obligatory "1 Song". Who can blame him? Maybe, he had things right in the U.S.,by charging a little more, he recieved an audience
who would not want to jepordize the experience. I feel so bad for some of you who have waited forever for this special time.

Me & my hubby went to the shows on Friday & Saturday night (which were superb - Prince was fantastic). We had tickets for the aftershow on Friday but decided not to bother going when we had been stood in the queue for a good half an hour and we saw the state of the people there. Drunk, leery, disgraceful behaviour. We all want to enjoy ourselves and have a good time but some people are just so disgusting. I was really looking forward to the aftershow but we decided that it just wasn't worth the upset. On reading the thoughts of other fans on here, I am so glad we decided to turn back.
We went to get the clipper boat back to our hotel & nearly everyone on the boat was wasted too!
Why do people have to get so steaming to enjoy themselves??? They spoil it for us more "normal" people who can manage on a couple of beers/wines without being drunk as a skunk!
Shame
[Edited 8/6/07 0:46am]

I was nearly attacked on Sat night by a vile drunk couple all because i dared to walk in front of them AFTER the show had finished. Luckily security saw what was going on and sorted them out in time. I don't drink so watching people act like this is vile and pretty scary.


You've got to ask yourself, if you were Prince and you saw what the crowd was like, would you want to go out and perform? It really is no wonder he's not done a full aftershow yet.

Louie1401 said:

It's quite bizarre really. As a licensed venue, the Indigo, like every other licensed venue has responsibilties to it's customers. It is illegal to let intoxicated people into the venue, it is illegal to sell alcohol to anyone who is in the venue who is in intoxicated. If anybody was to report the goings on to a local licensing authority, I think you'd find things would change. The security and management at the Indigo need to sort this out. I run a club up in Leeds with a 2500 capacity, and the atmosphere is great. The reason? Anyone pissed doesn't get in, or if they are intoxicated inside and causing a nuisance will be ejected. I suspect the problem here is the ticket cost, and there refund policy. They should basically have a large pot of cash on the front door, and anyone deemed too drunk to go in should be refunded, and politely told no. I bet this doesn't happen, as yet again it's all about the money. This country is turning into a hole.

Anotherloverholeinyohead said:

I swear this is the exact same guy who pushed past me at the bar (after I had already been waiting for over 15 minutes) elbowed me in the ribs about 5 times, and proceeded to yell to the bartender to give him champagne. The bartender said they didn't have any downstairs, that he needed to be upstairs to be served champagne, and the guy got more and more aggressive and demanded that he be served (after he totally cut in line anyway ).

Then he kept repeating everything the bartender said to other people, like a 6 year old would do, and the bartender was getting so pissed at him I thought he was about to jump over the bar and grab the guy.

God he was horrible.

Before him though, this woman cut in front of me in the same way so she could get her drinks.
[Edited 8/6/07 4:17am]

Personally, I found the pissed people a lot easier to handle than some of the fanatics who insist on cramming in rather than relaxing.

Given the choice, I rather go to an open bar venue than a cattle herding experience some fan events can turn into.

Look at the First night of the ONA tour in London for example. Theres an example of fanatics trampling everywhere and ignoring the managements requests.

And not a beer in sight.

Yep, i found the shoulder barges really strange for a prince show. And you had guys in groups who looked like the local gym

The tendency to drink is going to be exacerbated by the weekend gigs. There were some pissheads on Wednesday, but I didn't notice anything like this. WE watched the queue disappear from the bar on the other side of the entrance, when it had gone, we walked into the Idigo2 and upstairs and sat down with a great view from the balcony. no pushing, no shoving, no fights.

I don't understand this need to get so close, anywhere in the venue is close enough to see prince's face. Why do you need to be able see if he's plucked his nose to have a good night.

Chill, and enjoy the rest of the shows.

PREDOMINANT said:

I think the people who are who need to be that close are the very people who seen to describe touching HIM, or his Gutar as some out of world experience!

Shame, these people down the front are the very reason he needs all the security and doesn't mix with his fans. They just don't realise they are the cause!

col said:

yeah i was there arguing 2..perhaps u heard me i was the one with the heavy glasgow accent arguing with a short n fat black girl who barged through 2 the front litterly banging my friends girlfrien n sending her flying..she was tottaly unapoligetic..wit a fukin cow

weejimmy said:

You shouldn't say "black girl", that's a very racist term according to some bellends on this forum.

This sounds very dissapointing and worrying. We are going later this month and I certainly dont want to be shoved, punched or as one girl in another thread said that a woman struck her in the throat at the concert! I enjoy a few drinks as much as the rest, but the aggresion I have been reading about seems to indicate the "type" of person attending these shows - low life scum is what I would call them. No matter how many drinks I have, I would NEVER hit someone. Also, in a normal nightclub here you cant take your drinks onto the dance floor for obvious reasons, cant see why they dont apply the same rule there. Overall, sounds like the security/bouncers arent doing their job properly at all

Mong said:

You shouldn't say bellend either, that is a positively disgusting term!

IRISHFAN said:

Security? Bouncers? Not from where I was standing (middle of the room near the sound desk). Noticed security outside the door, but on the inside it was just barstaff. Maybe there were bouncers inside, but I didn't see anyone and I was keeping an eye out because of ol' mister pink top!

i'm glad that i was not the only one that thought friday night's crowd were a bunch of ignorant piss heads who shouldn't have been allowed into the aftershow ( and a big precentage showed no respect during the main show either- bringing pizza and fish and chips into a prince gig is surely so disrespectful!).

i had been looking forward to these shows for a long time and had to twist a lot of arms to get there at all. we travelled nearly 5 hours to get pushed and shoved by a very pissed and aggressive fat girl that stank of lager.my husband ( a very placid man) eventually shoved her back and did the jerry springer type hand to the face thing with a very aggressive " don't touch me" to get her to move away and stop pissing evryone off.

i saw prince in the wings watching the crowd and got excited that he was going to come on and play, and was dissapointed that he didn't, but actually looking back on it and how the crowd were i am not at all suprised.

another thing- what was all the booing going on between encores? i was stood there saying "no no no" to my husband- as if prince would want to come back on to a booing crowd.!

after looking forward to these shows i was left feeling quite upset at how awful some had been. i was glad that i had tickets for saturday night's performance ( but not aftershow) and it was a much better feeling in the audience and a noteably better show by prince and the band.but he even didn't stay on long at the saturday aftershow ( according to a friend that attended)

how lucky must the girl up on stage with the short dress and long hair be feeling.... it's not every day you get to dance/sing with prince on stage and have him say he likes your dress! lucky lucky girl!

The atmosphere hasn't felt all that great up front for the 2 shows I went to. On Saturday a couple of people tried to push all the way to the front during Nikka Costa's set. Several groups of people told them that they should move back, but they just argued with all of them, including me.

If people queue for 30-60 mins and then keep their place for 2 hrs, it is a mighty cheek for someone to push their way past.

emmastesia said:

I hope noty all aftershows are like that. Hopefully the non fans will get bored and try selling tickets instead of going in.

Much better atmosphere with just Prince fans.

Manchester Party in September will be full of friendly people out to enjoy themselves with nothing but Prince music and chat!

Savage said:

I have been looking forward to 18th aug for ages , and great its a sat! I really hope they do something about all this cos its totally disrespectful and disgustin. Ruining it for everyone, i actually cant believe some of the stuff i am reading.

emmastesia said:

Yeah, but he totally shot her down for not being able to sing.

I went to both Friday and Saturday aftershows taking a friend and my brother & girlfriend who were all casual fans. I had waxed lyrical about how amazing an aftershow experience would be. How wrong was I? I do not need to elaborate as enough of you have already set the scene re: drunk, nasty people....very sad.

However, I just wanted to add that it was not just the crowd that were unnecessarily agressive - the security crew on Saturday included a very obnoxius guy who completely out of the blue pushed my brothers girlfriend from behind and knocked her bag off her shoulder. She thought someone was trying to steal her bag and turned to confront him. The comments that followed went something like this: "Why do I want to steal your bag I'm earning £4000 a week" ..we tried to complain to him about his aggressive behaviour but he just blew up: "Are you getting bored yet? Do you want to leave now?"...maybe he was just enjoying his new found position of power but surely this kind of confrontation just adds to what was already proving to be a bad atmosphere...

Unless I start to hear good things I'm skipping the aftershows until the final on the 21st September - when I plan to take my boyfriend for a birthday treat (??). I just hope that all the true fans have snapped up these tix so that we can just get down and have a really funky farewell party
[Edited 8/7/07 2:17am]
[Edited 8/7/07 2:19am]

emmastesia said:

The booing after the first encore on Friday night was at some guy on the floor who got rowdy and violent. He was eventually carried out by security with his girlfriend trailing behind them looking utterly humiliated. It wasn't aimed at the band or Prince.

I agree the audience was much more rowdy and drunk than I have ever seen at a Prince show.

I am still utterly dismayed by the Aftershow.

I didnt see any aggression at all


seriously everyone that i met was absolutely nice and friendly

See you's all this Friday and Saturday

Aftershow, Friday 3rd August

This was my experience…

We went to the main show first.

I was there with two friends. I had an aftershow purchased from Ticketmaster ages ago, and my friends did not. After listening to me going on about how great the aftershow would be, and being told by the guy at the box office at the 02 and the doorman that he would DEFINITELY be performing; we decided to get more tickets.

The box office guy told me they only had upstairs tickets left. I had a downstairs ticket. He told us the upstairs tickets could not get you downstairs so I purchased three tickets for upstairs so we could all stay together. When we entered, it was obvious that we upstairs tickets could get you downstairs, which was where we stayed.

So I ended up with 4 tickets for 3 people clearing indicating Prince official after show (not party) and being told by the official 02 box office a matter of hours before the show he was definitely on. I was even given a time, 1230 to 1am.

I enjoyed the main show, but my friends were not over impressed. As for the whole aftershow experience, it was a complete disgrace. We eventually left at about 3am. It completely soured the night and I feel very strongly that funds should be refunded.

As for loads of people being drunk, you can’t have it both ways. If Prince is going to play a large arena then there simply are not enough hard core fans (I consider myself one) to fill the arena night after night. So you get a broad spectrum, some people are there because hey, Prince is in town, its £ 35, on a Friday, why not? As for the drinking, the aggression is wrong but let me say the friends I was with had plenty to drink before, during and afterwards and in the aftershow, we hung around near the bar or where there was plenty of space. There was no need for ANYONE with drinks to be fighting down the front - everywhere was a good view in Indigo and it was not even jam packed.

Look at it another way, if he had come on stage there would have been no tension and bad atmosphere. Personally, I don't recall a bad atmosphere; just that Dr. John killed the excitement in the room and it because very subdued.

Let's face it, without being disrespectful to Dr. John and his fans, who on earth wants to see him after a Prince gig?

I have main and aftershow tickets for the 24th and am going expecting to be disappointed by the aftershow. It’s the only way.

themellowone said:

Maybe the woman in question thought you were trying to grind against her. It seems like the English yob culture is spilling over into the most unlikely places. I have yet to attend an aftershow but will be in sept for a couple of nights, what is the age range like is it mostly oldies?..